Twenty-four brave people on bikes showed up for a very chilly and windy April Year of Yay! ‘Earth Day’ ride. We rode 18.6 miles, and along the way we learned about our interconnectedness with water, ways we can get involved with local environmental improvement efforts and what each of us can do at home to live more ‘green’ and sustainably. Check the route we took and read on for what it brought us!

Gearing up!

Our group of fearless riders rolled out of Whole Foods Easton and headed west towards the Alum Creek Trail towards our first stop along that path—Edward Franklin Honton Memorial Bridge.

Snowy bridges made for some challenging riding on the Alum Creek Trail.

From here, our group had a good view of Alum Creek where we listened to David Hohmann of FACT (Friends of Alum Creek and Tributaries) tell us about watersheds, why they are important, pollutants that threaten them and what we can do to protect and restore them.

Everyone is bundled up for our first chilly stop!

After that we continued south on the trail towards our next destination—a private residence in Clintonville—to learn about what each of us can do at home to live more sustainably. But along the way we decided to make a stop at the bridge overlooking Glen Echo Ravine so that our other guest rider and presenter, Tad Dritz of Green Columbus, could tell us about his organization and volunteer opportunities with ‘Branch Out,’ the weeklong Earth Day Columbus volunteer effort to clean up neighborhoods, remove invasive species like honeysuckle, tend to community gardens and, of course, plant trees (Columbus has a goal to plant 300,000 trees by 2020).

Mike Sapp standing in a bed of Kentucky bluebells as he tells us about rain barrels, composting and other at home earth friendly ways to live.

Just up Indianola from the Glen Echo Ravine was our third and final stop, the home of FLOW (Friends of Lower Olentangy Watershed) super volunteer, Mike Sapp. Mike talked about things we can do at home to protect the watershed in which we live. He showed us around his yard where he has rain barrels installed to keep water from leaving his property, an impressive compost arrangement, lots of good native plant species and his newly acquired hobby–honey bees!

From there we headed back to the warmth of Whole Foods where we enjoyed great company, food and drink. Sure, it was 30 degrees out and winds were around 20 miles per hour, but the company along the ride made it seem effortless. Thanks for all who came out to make it a super great day!

And finally, as always, this month's button, courtesy local artist Thom Glick: